


The Lincolnshire Tempests (1890)

by Cerdic519



Series: Elementary 221B [116]
Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms, Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Detectives, Alternate Universe - Victorian, Destiel - Freeform, Government Conspiracy, Johnlock - Freeform, M/M, Minor Character Death, Murder, Untold Cases of Sherlock Holmes
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-06-11
Updated: 2017-06-11
Packaged: 2018-11-12 19:43:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,998
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11168787
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cerdic519/pseuds/Cerdic519
Summary: What starts out looking like a natural disaster ends with a body in the wrong place, a body of someone known to Sherlock and John. The oleaginous Bacchus Holmes is implicated and finally goes that one step too far, causing his younger brother to call in the cavalry - and for once, family does end in blood!





	The Lincolnshire Tempests (1890)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [supersockie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/supersockie/gifts).



> Mentioned elsewhere as 'the Abbas Parva tragedy'.

Our next (published) case together would not take place until March of eighteen hundred and ninety. Before that, two events in my own life occurred, the first, regretfully, being my thirty-eighth birthday, which I marked most reluctantly. Well, reluctantly to start with, until Sherlock made it a day to remember. 

A few months prior, we had been browsing in the jewellery shop on our way back to Baker Street when he observed that one of the items in the window looked very much like a ring that my late mother had once owned. Most of her jewellery I had given to Sammy, but that one item I had kept, on a chain around my neck. I had told Sherlock that, in my carelessness, I had lost it somewhere on my rounds one day. He expressed his condolences and nothing more was said on the matter, for which I was grateful. The loss of that gewgaw was, if truth be told, still a little raw; it was about the only thing of my mother's that was really personal to me.

I really should have known better about my friend's reticence. He secretly wrote to Sammy and obtained a full description of the ring, along with a drawing and measurements. And on my birthday he had presented me with what was a perfect copy, even down to the tiny D-shaped nick on the left-hand side that it had mysteriously acquired over the years. I was only thankful that there was a box of tissues handy on the nearby table, as the dust in the room was suddenly making my eyes water.

The second development occurred barely a week after my birthday (which yes, the magnificent Mrs. Harvelle marked with pie, bless her!), and again concerned my little brother. A telegram arrived from Sammy, which I assumed at first was merely about his wife's pregnancy, Jessica being due to give birth in late March. It was, however, nothing of the sort.

“I have a brother!” I spluttered over the breakfast-table.

Sherlock squinted at me over his first coffee of the day. In my shock, I had forgotten to wait for him to become fully coherent. 

“I know”, he growled. “The tall one. Hates clowns.”

“No”, I said testily. “I have another brother. Sammy has just been contacted by a young fellow just turned twenty-one, by the name of Adam Milligan. It turns out that whilst our mother was working her fingers to the bone, our father was raising a second family a few miles away in Bamburgh. He was with one Miss Katherine Milligan, and left her a signed letter admitting his paternity of their son.”

Sherlock downed his coffee and looked at me thoughtfully.

“What will you do about it?” he asked. 

“What is there to do?” I asked resignedly. “What's done is done. I never had much respect for my father when he was alive, but this just about takes the pie!”

Sherlock downed his second coffee, in one draught as usual. I was surprised that he did not have steam coming out of his ears.

“Is the boy doing all right?” he asked. I re-read the missive.

“Sammy says that the boy only made contact because his mother passed on and bequeathed him our father's note”, I said. 

“Do you want to go up and meet him?” Sherlock asked. 

“I am not sure”, I said. “I cannot see that we have much in common, apart from a useless father.

“And I suppose that now, _you_ are almost old enough to be his father!” Sherlock teased. 

I scowled at him for that. 

“I suppose that I had better go”, I said resignedly. “What a mess!”

+~+~+

Fortunately my meeting with my newly-acquired half-brother passed off better that I had hoped, or feared. Mr. Adam Milligan reminded me a little of myself at his age, and I felt every one of the sixteen years that I had on him. He worked as a teacher's assistant in Bamburgh, ironically at the same school that Sammy and I had once attended, so he seemed set up financially, at least. It was also pleasant to see Sammy and my heavily-pregnant sister-in-law when I journeyed on to Berwick-on-Tweed, and I spent an enjoyable weekend in the North.

It was early February when I returned to the capital, and to Sherlock. I was glad to be back, but as the season progressed I felt a rising tension, as I knew that my friend was straining every sinew in his efforts to draw a net around Doctor James Moriarty. Sometimes, he would whimper in his sleep, and I would pull him as close as I could and whisper how much I loved him. I wished that I could have done more to help, but I was only the whetstone upon which the sharp knife that was his brilliant mind needed the occasional sharpening. He was definitely more prone to want me close to him even during our waking hours, and I noted that he seemed less inclined to take cases away from London. So I was surprised when, one cold February morning, he mentioned that a case required us to make a return to Lincolnshire, where four months before we (he) had solved the case of the Fenland Assassin.

“Which Part?” I yawned as I passed half my bacon to him, as per usual. It must have been a bad morning because, unusually, I got a second piteous look, which promptly made me fork over the rest.

“All of me”, he said, looking confused. “I can hardly send my lower half on its own, John.”

I was about to clarify that I very obviously meant which of the three Parts of that county he had been summonsed to, when I caught the slightest twitch of his lips. He was having me on, the bastard!

“I have a good mind to take my bacon back!” I pouted.

That earnt me the terrible Quivering Lip, as if I was the worst room-mate ever to be inflicted on someone so small and helpless (hah!) as the man before me. I rolled my eyes and sat back; at least Mrs. Harvelle, used to her genius lodger's ways, always made sure that I had some extra food on my plate to start with, to make up for my regular morning charity handover.

“Lindsey”, he said, in between crunching happily on his mountain of bacon. “Specifically, Abbas Parva.”

My eyes widened. Of course I had read in the paper, the day before yesterday, about how the small village of that name on the east coast had been all but destroyed by a terrible winter storm, but surely they were not expecting Sherlock to sort out Acts of God now?

“Sir James Thatcher, who is coroner for the Holland Part of the county, has written to me”, Sherlock explained. “He thinks that something is rather strange about one of the bodies found in the ruins of the village.”

“Surely that would have reached the newspapers?” I said dubiously. I did not like the press much, some of whom did not have the good taste of the “Times” and had mocked my work as being 'fit only for the huddled masses', but I knew that keeping anything from them was difficult if not impossible. 

“That”, Sherlock said, “is why it is so interesting.”

He looked around the table for something, then at me.

“John”, he said in that piteous 'I am about to ask you to do something for me, and you know that you are going to do whatever I ask' voice. I sighed.

“What is it?”

“The sauce is over on the sideboard.”

I sighed again, but got up and fetched him the red bottle. I was rewarded with a gummy smile and some happy crunching.

“Honestly”, I grumbled. “I might as well wear a French maid's costume, for all that I fetch and carry for you these days.”

His rebuttal of that was slow. Too slow. As in, there was none. I stared at him, and realized that he was actually picturing.....

“Sherlock! Do you mind?”

He sniggered. It was worth a little humiliation to see him happy.

+~+~+

The following day we headed once more for the Great Northern Railway's station at King's Cross, and a fast train to Peterborough. We then changed to a much slower one which ambled as we had done four months earlier to Boston, then continued through a number of small and inconsequential places before we reached Willoughby Junction, where we had to change again for the coast loop line. The town of Mablethorpe, which I suppose would have looked quite welcoming to its summer tourists, seemed both dismal and shut, and I wondered at our alighting there rather than closer to Abbas Parva – or what was left of it – which I knew lay some seven or eight miles further up the coast.

“Sir James has arranged to meet us here”, Sherlock explained. 

“I thought that you said he was the coroner for Holland?” I asked. “We are some way into Lindsey. Does he live out of his working area?”

“I wondered at that too”, Sherlock said. “I know that he has a town house in Boston, but perhaps he chose here because it is nearer the scene of whatever happened. He was remarkably uninformative about his concerns, although I had the impression that they were not something that he felt were suitable for the telegraph system. Which, given how reliable that system is, concerns me.”

+~+~+

I had some doubts about Sherlock's friend, especially when we pulled up outside a small place on the northern outskirts of the town, and saw that it was called “Boddy Cottage”! Fortunately Sir James, a fine old gentleman with silver hair and a pronounced limp, was able to explain matters quite quickly.

“I was a little concerned over what had transpired”, he said, “and although I probably read too much detective fiction, I decided to take the precaution of meeting you here, my sister's house. It is just a coincidence that it was built some years back by a local writer, a Mr. Enford Boddy.”

I was about to thank him for his explanation when someone who was sleeping alone that night cut in.

“Writers these days!” he said.

I huffed indignantly, and they both laughed.

“I was going to write to you anyway, Mr. Holmes”, the coroner said, “even before recent events. But.... well, I shall take you to the town – that is where we have the body - and perhaps your doctor friend can take a look at him.”

“Only one body?” I asked, surprised. “I thought that most of the village lost their lives?”

“ _That_ is the problem”, the coroner sighed. “I do not think that this man was a villager – yet I have no idea what he was doing there.”

+~+~+

“The deceased was a middle-aged man, blond and in good physical condition”, the coroner said as I donned some protective clothing before the examination. “The strangest thing about him was that he had no identification on him whatsoever. There were no suspicious marks, and it seemed as if he had been caught in the storm and drowned, like the rest of the place. But I do not like it.”

“What made you not want to talk to us in Boston?” Sherlock asked. To my surprise the coroner reddened.

“I overheard my deputy talking to someone in a small side-office at my work”, he said. “I had gone out and was not due back, and I heard his voice through an open window.”

Sherlock looked at him sharply. I was surprised; his statement seemed fair enough. But the man then blushed even more.

“I could not of course see who he was talking to”, he said. “The room has only one small slatted window, high up. But my colleague did address him by name the one time.”

“And?” Sherlock asked. The coroner gulped.

“He said, 'yes, Mr. Holmes'.”

We both stared at him in shock.

+~+~+

The surprises of that day were, as it turned out, far from over. I thought to myself as Sherlock and I entered the cold room where the body of the victim had been stored that it was most likely Mr. Bacchus Holmes that the coroner's deputy had been talking to – but then why would the lounge-lizard be interested in an accidental death in distant Lincolnshire? It made no sense.

I pulled back the sheet covering the body, then nearly dropped it. Sherlock, of course, seemed un-fazed, although surely he must have been as shocked as I was.

“Sergeant Adam-Henry Bartholomew”, he said quietly. “Well, well. What are you doing all the way up here?”

+~+~+

Indeed. What on earth was the awful London policeman, who we had only met some two years back in the case concerning Sherlock's former tutor Mr. Inias Atkinson, doing so far from his beat? And visiting a village just as it got destroyed? It seemed frankly incredible!

I completed my examination, and did not like what I found. Sherlock stood by me in silence, and afterwards we rejoined his friend, who drove us back to the cottage.

“What do you think?” Sir James asked me.

“The signs are consistent with someone who drowned, having been inside a building that was overwhelmed by water”, I said carefully. 

“But there was something else, was there not?” Sherlock asked softly. I nodded.

“He had been poisoned beforehand”, I said. “The signs were almost undetectable, but I have seen that particular poison before. I would think that if you tested samples of his hair, they would show that his body was trying to expel the poison that way. The traces would be very slight, but a second and more definite sign is that this poison turns the finger-nails a very distinctive blue-grey colour.”

I cannot of course name the poison involved, nor the (undocumented) case in which I had come across it, but I will say that it was a very rare poison indeed, the sort of thing that only the very rich or powerful could have gotten hold of. Or, as I knew Sherlock was thinking just then, a government. Sherlock turned to the coroner.

“Some time in the next day or so, the dead man's wife or some other relative will appear to identify him”, he said. “They will give a false name, and will want possession of the body immediately. I am indeed quite surprised that they have not come already.”

“You think that the body should not be handed over?” Sir James asked.

“You are not the coroner for this county”, Sherlock said. “I am sure that, whoever that unfortunate person is, they have already been 'advised' to brook no such delay. As I said, I am only surprised that they have waited this long. Tell us about Abbas Parva.”

The coroner sighed.

“It is a sad tale”, he said. “As I am sure you know, the new German Kaiser Wilhelm II, despite being our dear Queen's grandson, is very militaristic, and I share the opinion of many that we shall soon find ourselves in some sort of 'arms race' against him. I say that because, just days after his accession, the government announced that they wanted to greatly improve the coastal defences of Kingston-upon-Hull, just up the coast.”

I nodded. The east coast of Yorkshire, on which that port stood, was renowned for advancing or retreating with surprising rapidity over time; indeed, one of our later cases (Shoscombe Old Hall) would be partly based on that fact.

“Abbas Parva is the only place for a few miles in either direction”, Sir James said. “Because there are so few people left – the population before the storm was down to barely twenty – the government decided to extract lots of stone from the beach there and take it to improve Hull. There were of course the usual re-assurances that such a practice was completely safe, and that the village would be fine.”

An assurance that was probably about as hollow as one of those new-fangled Easter eggs, I thought. 

“A year passed, and last week, as you know, we had that terrible storm”, the coroner said. “Four days of constant gales, and when they subsided, the village was more or less gone. A couple of houses that had stood apart and on higher ground survived, but the bulk, on the path down to the beach, were ruined. Your man, we found in one of the houses.”

“Why was he not kept with the other victims?” I wondered.

“That was one of the other things that worried me”, the coroner said. “In all the confusion of sorting out the mess after the storm, I thought at first that it would have been easy to miss the one body. All the rest had been taken to Louth, inland, and they were hard put to cope. When we found one extra one, I suggested this room at the back of the station here, which I had used for my work before and knew was always cold.”

“This man was murdered.”

We both looked at Sherlock in surprise.

“How can you be sure?” Sir James asked. “Might he not have taken his own life?” 

“A London policeman turns up in dead in Lincolnshire, and my lounge-lizard of a brother actually leaves his beloved office and comes to the scene of the crime?” Sherlock scoffed. “Bacchus is more firmly tied to our capital that I myself. Why was he murdered, that is the question. And, if he was killed elsewhere, why....”

He trailed off, seemingly lost in his thoughts. I watched him anxiously, but thankfully he seemed to re-engage with the rest of us soon enough.

“Thank you for inviting us in on this case, Sir James”, he said. “John, I think a few days of Lincolnshire sea air will do us the world of good. We shall find a hotel in this town, and relax.”

I wondered at spending time in a place like this so far out of season, when the only things to look at were a grey sea and a greyer sky, but I said nothing. I was sure that Sherlock had his reasons.

+~+~+

“This must be something bad”, I ventured, once we had safely booked into the town's Grand Hotel (a name that it did not really live up to). He nodded.

“I am thinking that it has something to do with the Pink Map”, he said.

I looked at him in confusion.

“You mean like a map of the Empire?” I asked. He shook his head.

“It has to be serious, because I know that it was causing Bacchus some concern, and yet he did not mention it when I met him last month. Fortunately I met Luke at the gymnasium, and he told me. It is all to do with Africa.”

I nodded. Shortly after Sherlock's return to my life, I had read of the Berlin Conference whereby the European Powers had, by some miracle, managed to reach agreement about spheres of interest in Africa, and thus hopefully prevent a war starting out there at least. One problem solved, so many more to go.

“The Portuguese, as you know, have possessions some way either side of our Cape Colony, on the east and west coasts”, Sherlock said. “There are some in Lisbon who wish to link those up, but that would stop a British advance northwards.”

“I would have thought that the government would not want the expense of such an area”, I said. I liked the idea of a red map denoting the British Empire, but I felt that some possessions were more trouble than they were worth. Moral issues apart, the whole point of an empire was that it should pay for itself, if not turn a profit.

“It is what I said about governments being like children”, Sherlock sighed. “Them not having something is one thing, but someone else having it – well, that is obviously quite unacceptable!”

I smiled at his shocked tone.

“A little time back, the Portuguese published something that has become known as 'the Pink Map'”, he explained. “It claims the lands across the northern flank of our south African colonies and links their eastern and western possessions, thus cutting us off. The implication that they are planning to occupy those lands has gone down very badly, and London has already expressed its displeasure at this cartographical blunder.”

“But how does that explain Sergeant Bartholomew being up here?” I asked.

“That is what Bacchus will tell us, once he realizes that I am staying in the area”, Sherlock said simply. “Hopefully.”

“And if he does not?” I asked.

Sherlock smiled strangely.

“Then he may just regret it!”

+~+~+

Fortunately, the weather improved slightly over the next few days, and at least it stopped raining. Walking along the sea-front however was, I quickly discovered, inadvisable, as the area possessed what they call a 'lazy wind' – one too lazy to blow around you, so it blows through you. Someone, of course remained as much of an inhuman heater as always, and I was even prepared to forgive what was more than a borderline smirk when, on returning to our rooms, I immediately wanted to hold him in my arms. 

What? I was damn cold!

By the weekend, I was beginning to wonder if Sherlock had mis-read his brother for once. However, he told me on Saturday that, sure enough, the lounge-lizard would be meeting us in the hotel dining-room, which unfortunately meant that I would not be able to set man-traps outside our room, worse luck. And Sherlock had been right about the body being claimed; a 'Mrs. Burnley' from Cleethorpes up the coast had identified the body as her missing husband, and it had been handed over to her at once. Much as I had disliked the policeman in life, I hoped that at least the government would grant him a decent burial.

The Grand Hotel's dining-area – well, I do not wish to be uncharitable, but I think that the designer had had one too many holidays out East, and had returned determined to create his very own Turkish delight. Or horror. Somehow the garish colours, decorated screens and whatever that was meant to be hanging from the lights did not sit well when one was having a fish-and-chips supper!

For some strange reason Sherlock asked me to come down to dinner five minutes after him, which made me wonder if he was preparing some little surprise for his annoying brother. But when I arrived into that dreadful room, there was no sign of anything, although I noted that Sherlock had secured the one table set a little apart from the others. He did not order, as he told me that our unwelcome visitor would be there any minute. Unfortunately he was (as ever) right.

Mr. Bacchus Holmes looked as irritating as ever, and he glared at both of us before taking a seat, and waving away a waiter. He sipped his glass of water and stayed silent.

“You are here to explain about Sergeant Bartholomew”, Sherlock said after a while (I hoped silently that the explanation would be a quick one, as I was quite hungry). The lounge-lizard scowled even more.

“I do not have to tell you anything, Sher”, he said sharply. “Or your 'friend' here.”

It was going to be one of Those Meetings, apparently. I waited, and wondered how long even the urbane lounge-lizard would last under that azure stare. An impressive forty-seven seconds was the answer.

“He investigated something that he had no right to stick his nose into”, Bacchus Holmes said crossly. “And before you ask, Sher, I have no idea who it was who ended his life. My job is clearing up messes, not making them.”

That was the second time that he had used Sherlock's nickname that he knew he hated, and the narrowed eyes that his younger brother was giving him were not apparently getting the message across that someone was treading on dangerous ground. I felt optimistic that the odds on blood being spilt were improving. Call for a doctor? Well, there was probably one around somewhere. I would volunteer to go and look for one if needed....

“He had no family”, our visitor said, “and when we heard of this disaster, I had the idea to hide the body here. It should have been reckoned another drowning, and would have done had you not stuck your nose in.”

I kept silent at that. I did not wish to drop poor Sir James in it.

“But it was the government who helped cause the calamity that killed twenty innocent people”, Sherlock said dryly. “You knew that it might expose the place to storm damage, yet you ignored that risk. And people died.”

“One cannot make an omelette without breaking eggs”, his brother sniffed. “You have bent if not broken the law yourself on several occasions.”

“Only in the pursuit of justice”, Sherlock said. “You knew about the risk to those villagers, yet you still went ahead and took their stone.”

“The report said that there was no risk”, his brother said haughtily.

What happened next was the second-best moment of my time in this baleful man's presence. Sherlock reached down and lifted a large document onto the table, then stared hard at his brother, who had gone deathly pale.

“You mean _this_ report?” Sherlock said silkily. “The one that states, quite categorically, 'sooner rather than later, the undefended village will be destroyed by a storm'?”

“Where did you get that?” his brother demanded. “Even I do not have a copy of that report, and as far as I know, all the originals were destroyed.”

“The government will find the person responsible for this, and sack them”, Sherlock said. “Furthermore, it will compensate the families of all those who died in this disaster.”

“Her Majesty's Government is not to be ordered about by the likes of you and your doctor 'friend'!” his brother snapped. “Tread carefully, Sher. I am not the only person in a position of authority who thinks that your removal might make life a lot easier for just about everyone.”

I gaped. Had he just.....

“Did you just threaten me, Bacchus?” Sherlock asked mildly. 

I stared between them. I was fighting for composure, and Sherlock sounded like he was discussing what to have for afternoon tea! 

“Just a warning”, the lounge-lizard said coldly. “You are more trouble than you are worth, lately.”

I was still reeling, but Sherlock seemed strangely calm. He shook his head at his brother.

“You have done many foolish things in your life, Bacchus”, he said softly. “But I rather think that that is the last one you will be doing for some considerable time.”

“Oh yes?” his brother sneered. “And what are you going to do to stop me, Sher? Run and tell mummy?”

Sherlock grinned, and rose to his feet. And what happened next constitutes the answer to what I know is the question on many readers' lips – what was the _best_ moment in my time with the lounge-lizard? That happened when Sherlock walked across the room and said his next few words:

“In this instance, I do not have to run very far. Hullo, Mother.”

Oh for a camera to capture the lounge-lizard's face, which had gone a shade of white I had hitherto thought impossible. For sailing round the garish screen came none other than Lady Rebecca Holmes, and the look on her face.....

“Baa-chus!” she bellowed. They must have heard her down in Lincoln.

“Come on!” Sherlock hissed, dragging me to the door. 

Part of me wanted to stay here and watch the blood being spilt, but my sense of self-preservation (coupled with absolute terror!) was infinitely stronger. I stumbled after him.

+~+~+

“It was very good of Mother to pay for Bacchus to be transferred back to London, was it not?”

It was full three days later, and I was still laughing. Lady Holmes had been ABsolutely Furious and then some at her fourth son for, in her hearing, threatening the life of her youngest. The lounge-lizard had had to spend two days in the town hospital before he could be moved – I would certainly never view a lady's parasol in quite the same way again after seeing how it could be wielded – and my least favourite Holmes would be off work for at least a month. Never mind spending money on all the latest weapons; we should just send Sherlock's mother to the front line, and any enemy with any sense would surrender forthwith!

I wondered if it was worth taking a risk, and decided that it was.

“And your mother was certainly pleased to see you afterwards”, I said. “Sherry-werry-werry-werry-werry'!”

He blushed fiercely.

“He will not try anything like that again”, he said firmly. 

He would not, I was sure of that. Anyone who thinks governments are slow-moving should know that, when pursued by an irate Lady Rebecca Holmes, the snail's pace suddenly becomes that of an express train accelerating downhill with a following gale force wind. The killer of Sergeant Bartholomew was found on the same day as her return to the capital, a Mr. Anthony Sedgefield, and he fled the country before he could be brought to trial. I was surprised that the Marquess of Salisbury had not barricaded Downing Street against Sherlock's mother, and I later learnt that an ill-advised remark from her eldest son Mycroft on the matter had led to his being banned from her house for a month, as well as needing hospital treatment for a fractured jaw. And Mr. Bacchus Holmes was not re-admitted to her good graces until he had written a fulsome letter of apology to us both. From his hospital bed.

Sherlock had it framed. I laughed every time I saw it.

+~+~+

Next time, someone seems to have a grudge against strange-coloured trees.

**Author's Note:**

> _Author's Note: Abbas Parva is based on a real place, Hallsands in Devonshire. The government licensed dredging there around the time of this story to defend the nearby harbour at Plymouth, and the lowered beach meant that the old village got swept away in a storm (1917). It took seven years for the villagers, some of whom moved to a new Hallsands further north, to get compensation, and even today the site of the old village is too dangerous to allow visitors, although there is a viewing platform where one can marvel at the solidity of 'government assurances'._


End file.
